Palo Alto’s Kim clears 7-foot high jump in finals
SOQUEL >> Palo Alto’s Aaron Kim had already won the Central Coast Section championship in the high jump Saturday when officials raised the bar once again.
The Boston University-bound senior had just cleared 6-foot, 10 inches — tied for both the state lead this season and best mark at the CCS meet since Overfelt’s Jeff Rogers cleared 7-3 in 1985 — when he took aim at 7-0.
Kim tried once and missed. He tried again and missed. Down to his last attempt, he trotted toward the bar, soared into the rarefied air, and hit the landing pad.
The bar didn’t move. The 7-foot high jump at Soquel High highlighted a meet that included five double individual winners: Sacred Heart Prep’s Luci Lambert (1,600, 800), St. Francis’ Kaley Peterson (100, 200), Bellarmine’s Nolan Topper (1,600, 3,200), El Camino’s Yutaka Roberts (400, 800) and Stevenson’s Evan Johnson (100, 200).
Kim didn’t win twice, but he had the day’s most memorable result.
“I’m excited for him,” Palo Alto coach Michael Davidson said. “He’s worked really hard over this last year. He deserves every bit of accolades that he’s going to get. I know how much passion he’s put into this.”
Content that his leadup to 7-0 included breaking the school record of 6-8 that stood for two decades and he matched this spring.
“That wasn’t my goal for today,” he said. “I just wanted to get that school record.”
Davidson said 7-0 is probably Kim’s limit, so “leave on a happy note.” And given that Kim’s personal best before this year was about 5-10, according to Davidson, the mark was even more stunning.
“He came into the season, ‘Coach, I really want to get to 6-4,’” Davidson said. “We jumped on the first day of practice and he jumped over 6 feet. I was like, ‘I think we need to be looking at 6-6.’ But as he started jumping a couple of times at the beginning of the season, I could see 6-8. I’ve been telling him all season 6-8 or 6-9. He’s been pushing for it.”
According to results on the CCS website, Kim’s mark ranks behind only Rogers’ 7-3 in the history of the section meet.
Other highlights
The boys 1,600 provided thrills on the track as Topper, bound for Stanford, lost the lead on the backstretch of the bell lap and reclaimed it from Archbishop Mitty’s Taylor Iden just before the finish line. Topper’s time of 4:07.97 — sixth-best in the state this season — just nipped Taylor’s 4:08.05.
Topper came back later to win the 3,200 in 9:12.78, leading Bellarmine to the boys team title.
Peterson propelled St. Francis to the girls team championship, winning the 100 in 12.23 and 200 in 24.82. She also ran anchor on the Lancers’ 4×100 relay, which won in 48.42.
Sacred Heart Prep’s Lambert won the girls 1,600 by more than nine seconds, finishing first in 4:54.36. The University of Virginiabound standout later won the 800 in 2:11.35.
Both marks were personal bests.
After the 1,600, Lambert said, “I really wanted to take control of that third lap. When I found myself shoulder-to-shoulder with the leader, I felt very cool and in control.”
Once she grabbed a big lead, Lambert said it took “a lot of positive talk” to keep going fast. “Anything
to keep myself focused and encouraging myself,” she added.
El Camino’s Roberts could barely walk after his victories in the 400 and 800, a rare double given that there is only one race between the two events.
Roberts won the 400 in 49.56, a personal best, and matched his top mark in the 800, charging down the home stretch to cross the line first in 1:53.32, the same time the junior had in the CCS semifinals last week.
The meet began Saturday morning with Silver Creek senior Charlie Dang easily repeating as discus champion. His winning toss of 170-5 was well off his personal best of 187-6 but was better than his winning mark as a sophomore, 168-6.
Baseball
DIVISION I: NO. 3 VALLEY CHRISTIAN 6, NO. 1 ARCHBISHOP MITTY 5 >> Thirdseeded Valley Christian held off a late rally by topseeded Archbishop Mitty to claim its fourth straight CCS championship. DIVISION II: NO. 8 SEQUOIA 11, NO. 2 SAN BENITO >> The Sequoia Ravens apparently didn’t take kindly to being seeded eighth. Their 20-3 regular-season record was No. 1 among the eight D-II qualifiers.
Sequoia got revenge for the seeding slight, storming to a 9-2 lead after four innings and flying off with the D-II title Saturday against No. 2 seed San Benito (17-10).
“I’ve never been part of a team that was as good as this one,” Sequoia coach Mike Doyle said.
JP Boyle continued his assault on opposing pitchers, going 3-for-3 with a homer, double, three RBI and three runs scored. In the semifinals against Leland, Boyle ended a scoreless tie with a two-run homer in the fifth that propelled Sequoia to a 5-2 triumph.
Other hitting stars for the Ravens (23-3) were Jack Lanham and Ben Singler with two RBI apiece, and Rocky Knuedler and Nick Swee, both with two hits.
Sequoia’s lineup consisted of nine seniors or juniors, and the experience paid off. The Ravens jumped to a 6-2 lead in the second, and a threerun fourth pretty much put the game out of reach. The closest San Benito got after that was 10-4 in the sixth.
Sequoia starting pitcher Dillon Goetz had to come out in the second inning when his shoulder tightened up, but Cole Kenyon took over and worked the final 5⅓ innings for the win. Goetz stayed in the game and was 1-for-4 at the plate with a run and an RBI.
— Mike Lefkow
DIVISION III: NO. 6 BURLINGAME 10, NO. 4 LOS ALTOS 2>> Burlingame’s season couldn’t have finished in any more appropriate fashion than for Max Alvira to get the final batter swinging, capping a completegame performance and a senior season in which he posted eight wins and a 2.18 ERA in 10 starts.
“It feels like the whole year we’ve been waiting for this,” Alvira said, after he allowed two runs over seven innings in Burlingame’s 10-2 title win. “It’s nice to get a CCS win for this team. It hasn’t happened in a while, so it feels really good.”
Coach Shawn Scott took over the program a year after the Panthers won the Division II title in 2010. Since then, he said the program had been working toward this moment.
“Even getting to the postseason on the peninsula is tough,” Scott said. “It just means a lot getting here.”
Alvira fooled the Los Altos lineup for the final five innings after the teams traded runs in the first two frames. The Panthers broke the game open with four runs in the fifth inning, then added on with four more in the seventh. Burlingame’s 5-6-7 hitters, junior Dexter Quisol, senior Jacob Cilia and senior Jake Caprini, all finished with two hits and at least a run driven in.
Senior shortstop Aaron Parker tripled and scored in the first and homered in his next plate appearance, accounting for all of the Eagles’ runs. — Evan Webeck
DIVISION IV: NO. 6 LEIGH 7, NO. 1 PALMA 2 >>
The sixthseeded Longhorns scored five unanswered runs to upset No. 1 Palma for the Division IV crown.
Both teams scored twice in the first, then Leigh scored what proved to be the winning run in the third. It stayed like that until the sixth, when the visitors added three more runs to make it 6-2.
Leigh finished the season with a 16-9 record and won its fourth CCS title, the last one in 2000. Palma ended the year at 12-8-1. DIVISION V: NO. 8 GILROY 5, NO. 3 PACIFIC GROVE 4 (10 INNINGS) >> Gilroy rallied from four runs down by scoring four times in the sixth to tie, then winning it with a run in the top of the 10th.
Despite entering the playoffs with a 2-7 record, the Mustangs knocked off top seed Soledad 6-5 and No. 5 seed The King’s Academy 4-2 to reach the finals.
Five of the eight entrants in Division V had sub-.500 records coming into the postseason. A sixth, Soledad, was 8-8-1.
Gilroy was menacing away from its home field, posting a 5-3 record on the road or in neutral stadiums. They were 0-4 at home.
Gilroy won its first CCS title in baseball. The four runs it scored in the sixth were more than Pacific Grove allowed in the first two games of the playoffs combined.
DIVISION VI: NO. 3 HARKER 16, NO. 1 STEVENSON 15 >> In what had to be the game of the day, Harker scored 11 runs in the top of the seventh, then held on to win. Winning pitcher Ian Williamson, who worked the final three innings, got the final out with a strikeout with the bases loaded.
Harker (20-6) trailed 14-5 when the wild seventh started.
At one point, 12 straight Harker batters reached base. Coach Mike Delfino said all 11 runs crossed the plate after two were out.
Team co-captain Andrew Chavez hit a two-run double that put the Eagles ahead 15-14.